News of faculty

27
Apr 2017

Art Basel Hong Kong

During March 22nd to 26th of 2017 a group of students of «Art Management and Gallery Business» RMA program had visited Hong Kong, where they have attended the Art Basel Hong Kong fair as well as it’s satellite — Art Central fair, met with the gallerists, learned about South Island Cultural District, attended exhibitions at the local galleries, as well as traveled Macau where they met with an artist Constantin Bessmertniy. The tour was guided by the curator of the program Nikolay Palazhchenko.

On Wednesday March 22nd, having only briefly rested from the overnight flight and have gotten slightly used to the incredible Hong Kong, the participants of the internship program headed out to the largest exhibition center where they met with the curator of the program and representative of the Art Basel fair in Russia Nikolay Palazhchenko. Nikolay: «This fair is unique particularly because only it’s the only place where you can see a merger of Eastern and Western galleries on such a tremendous scale. Meeting under one roof, the European, American and Asian art assumes a new functionality that is marked by the collaboration and produces a new meaning».

This is the fifth time Art Basel fair is taking place in Hong Kong. In 2017 at the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Center there were exhibition stands from 242 galleries representing 34 countries, being attended by more than 80 thousand visitors. This year, the Art Basel Hong Kong had secured it’s title of not only the largest fair in Asia, but also of one of the main venues of international art industry.

The second day of the business tour was devoted to studying of city’s cultural life, which gets dramatically enriched during the fair. Throughout the week, numerous city galleries and museums organize special exhibitions and tours for the fair visitors, with many additional satellite fairs springing up to display their exhibits. Among them we have visited the South Island Cultural District, M+, Museum as well as Art Central fair.

The March 24th began with a visit to the galleries in the Soho neighborhood, where we enjoyed the presentations by the representatives of 10 Chancery Lane, Pearl Lam Galleries, a.m. space, Galerie Huit and Puerta Roja. In the Pedder Building we have attended the branches of the world renowned galleries: Gagosian Gallery Ben Brown, Hanart TZ Gallery. On the same day, the participants of the internship went on a tour at the Art Basel gallery guided by the curator Nikolai Palazhchenko, where they viewed many works of art and have met the gallerists who talked about some of the most interesting works on display.

On the last day we have visited Macau, where we met with an artist Konstantin Bessmertniy. He talked about his own work and life in Macau, and had given us a tour of the AD LIB exhibition at the Macau Museum of Art.

This internship was really intense, in many different ways, in terms of many new locations, different approaches of doing business, combining the modern technologies with the art, it was also really hard hitting in terms of the pace of moving through the city: at times it seemed that we had no strength left and it’s time for a break, but then shortly we’d be getting a second breath, and would carry on ahead toward the new exciting impressions.